Fiction Writing Workshop: Find Your Relevant Sources

Step by Step Guide:

Finding, Evaluating, and Citing Information Sources

The academic research is a standard feature of every student at LUMS. Therefore for every student, research projects raise important questions, such as: Where do you find relevant information for your research? How do you find, evaluate and manage that information retrieved?

When you engage in academic research, shrewd and knowledgeable in the realities of your research topics. You must:

Know where and how to search efficiently to find the best information for your purposes

Make good decisions regarding the quality and appropriateness of your information sources, including assessing whether a resource is trustworthy and up-to-date

Know who has rights to the work you use

Know how to properly give others credit for their ideas

Know the extent to which you can ethically remix or synthesize ideas and information in your own work

This is where research skills and knowledge of LUMS academic integrity guidelines are key.

Your approach to information research, like your needs and requirements regarding sources of information, will vary depending on what you research. A quick Google or Wikipedia search may suit your purposes in some scenarios, but, for academic research, that’s just the first step.

When you conduct academic research, you join a community of scholars in a chain of conversation and truth seeking that has gone on for centuries before you. In the digital age, you have more access to collected information than anyone else has ever had.

Digital literacy is the ability to find, evaluate, utilize, share, and create content using information technologies and the Internet.

Searching Books

Books can help you to get a better idea of your topic, as they contains lots of ideas, concepts, as well as keywords and a bibliography. It’s the best way to get your research started.

Web Discoveryconnects you to all LUMS databases, eliminating the need to check each individual database for appropriate materials. Doing so works well when the "obvious" databases are not giving you the materials you need.